Products

Specialty application catalysts

Food & Packaging

The importance of maintaining a safe and good working environment is increasing more and more all over the world. Within the food & packaging industry for example, there is an issue with volatile compounds such as hydrogen peroxide and ozone. HC&E has over the years developed catalysts which adresses these issues and they are descibed below in our catalyst family FOOCAT.

1Hydrogen peroxide

2Ozone

1Hydrogen peroxide

HC&E has developed the catalyst HNC-30 for decomposition of hydrogen peroxide in the gas phase. The catalyst has been implemented in the food processing industry and the company has almost 300 reference reactors worldwide. HNC-30 treats hydrogen peroxide vapor and entrained droplets present in air and the conversion of hydrogen peroxide is above 99.9 % with an expected lifetime of more than 3 years.

2Ozone

Another catalyst developed by HC&E is HNC-40 which is designed for abatement ozone in air. The catalyst can be implemented in the food processing industry and displays both high conversion of ozone as well as excellent life time. HC&E are happy to discuss the use of the catalyst in your applications.

Hydrogen generation

HC&E has over a number of year been involved in research, development and demonstration of hydrogen generation a. In this work a number of catalysts, e.g. for reforming, water-gas shift and selective CO oxidation, have been developed and tested. In addition, a couple of more specialised catalysts that fulfil very specific niche needs within hydrogen generation have been developed. These materials have been collected under the brand name HUCAT and are all described below.

1Saturation of hydrocarbons

2Pre-reforming

3Steam reforming

4Catalytic partial oxidation

5Water-gas shift

6Preferential oxidation

7Tail-gas combustion

1Saturation of hydrocarbons

HC&E has developed ASC-10 to adress the issue with non saturated hydrocarbons such as alkenes and alkynes. ACS-10 uses hydrogen to saturate these compounds with temperatures as low as 150 °C; the selected temperature is of course dependent on the application. This way, the carbon formation is avoided and unnecessary changes of catalyst or loss of time-on-stream can be avoided. The catalyst is developed to handle the difficulties encountered in small-scale reforming and is therefore tolerant to 750 °C to handle full stops, oxidizing environments and temperature equalization.

2Pre-reforming

The purpose of a pre-reformer section is to decompose higher hydrocarbons to methane, carbon monoxide and hydrogen. HC&E product PRC-20 is a catalyst that is specifically developed for handling the pre-reforming situation, with an extremely high activity. The catalyst can convert longer chain hydrocarbons e.g saturated and unsaturated C2 and C3 molecules.

3Steam reforming

The conversion of hydrocarbons, ranging from methane to heavier compounds, are possible using the SRC-series from HC&E with several potential materials depending on the feedstock composition and desired operating window. Although for heavier materials, a combination of a pre-reforming and steam reforming catalysts are recommended, to prolong lifetime, encompass more difficult fuels and lower the cost of the primary reformer.

4Catalytic partial oxidation

The HC&E catalyst for partial oxidation, CPC-14, is based on the same platform as the pre-reforming catalyst and uses high temperature stabilised support material to tolerate high temperature excursions. The active phase is however tailored to the application. HC&E are happy to discuss the use of the catalyst in new applications.

5Water-gas shift

With respect to water-gas shift, HC&E has developed a medium temperature shift catalyst. WGC-18 uses a transition metal support in combination with a precious metal support to generate a catalyst performing well with respect to activity and selectivity. The relatively low light-off temperature of the catalyst (T50 = 275 °C at 125,000 h-1 and 0.2-0.4 mm particles) is ensured by structural promoters added to the catalyst after noble metal addition.

6Preferential oxidation

Preferentially oxidising CO in hydrogen is a reaction, which puts high demands on catalyst selectivity. POC-15 is a catalyst developed by HC&E for preferential oxidation of CO. The catalyst display very low reverse water-gas shift activity, even at temperatures above 200 °C, and a remarkable oxygen selectivity. Even at a high oxygen surplus, only 40 % more oxygen than needed for the conversion of CO is consumed.

7Tail-gas combustion

In certain situations, the recovery of heat is required from low energy-density gases containing lean mixtures of hydrogen, carbon monoxide and methane. This may be challenging using flame combustion, but as an alternative HC&E offer TCC-10, a catalyst suited for converting the component of these gases to carbon dioxide and water. The performance, especially with respect to methane is strongly dependent on operating conditions so please consult HC&E and we will assist in the specific application.

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